


Tonight I’m Gonna Cut It Out and then Restart

by pasdexcuses



Category: Social Network (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Doctor Who AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-08
Updated: 2012-10-08
Packaged: 2017-11-15 21:52:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/532165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pasdexcuses/pseuds/pasdexcuses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Doctor Who AU. Following Eduardo outside, Mark prepares himself to have an argument about limits and people who are not allowed to touch his TARDIS. Eduardo, however, has other plans. He pins Mark to the door, stepping very, very close, disregarding Mark’s personal space altogether and ignoring the multitude of people staring at them in the city where they have just landed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tonight I’m Gonna Cut It Out and then Restart

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so, so much to my amazing betas queenofanavia and missthi83 for putting up with me. Seriously, I needed so much hand-holding and you guys were fabulous.
> 
> Also, check out neon_footprint's awesome [fanmix!](http://neon-footprint.livejournal.com/50914.html).

**Disclaimer:** This work is based on the characters as portrayed in the movie The Social Network, not real people. And, obviously, I’m not making any money from this. Title and lyrics in the cuts from _Shake it Out_ by Florence + the Machine.

 

_Tonight I’m Gonna Cut It Out and then Restart_

 

 

**_.prologue_ **

  
These books are their story, written a thousand times and then a thousand more. This is their story, lived a million and one times and then some more, always the same, always different, dark, bright, sad, happy, buried, alive. These books are their story, relived, relearned. These books are Mark cutting off and restarting. Rebooting and retrying for the perfect time. 

 

Yet no matter how hard he tries, how many worlds he writes and unwrites, the truth is the truth. Mark knows, deep down in the core of his bones, that the perfect time is the first. But he travels on and on, rewriting their story and their world.

 

They all seem the same, no matter how much the details change. 

 

_**.00** _

 

The first time Mark meets Eduardo, he has decided to take Chris to the Library. The TARDIS lands on the planet, and before Chris can ask where they are, Mark is strutting out, walking into a large room. 

 

“Doctor,” Chris starts as they both pace around the room. “Where are we?”

 

Tapping his fingers on a large wooden desk, Mark looks up and around them. There must be thousands, hundreds of thousands of books in this room alone. 

 

“ _The_ Library,” Mark replies, smirking.

 

Oh, the Library. Mark loves, loves computers and code, it is fascinating but libraries. Libraries are immense computers, if you think about it. You just need to know how to work the system to properly navigate it. And this library. This library is special. Biggest library in the whole universe. Biggest library of all time. The Classics, the new, the old, the ancient. 

 

Mark breathes in the smell of old books, preserved by technology. 

 

“Doctor!” Chris calls. 

 

“Yes?”

 

“I asked what library?”

 

“The Library.”

 

“Which one?”

 

Mark spins around so Chris can watch him roll his eyes. “The one that is a planet.”

 

Chris’ eyes do that thing where they open as though they are about to pop out and his mouth falls open half an inch. “This is a _planet_?”

 

“Are you going to repeat everything I say?” 

 

“Asshole.”

 

“Wanna go back?” Mark asks, waving a hand around.

 

He is already distracted by everything inside this place. Or more exactly, the lack thereof. Sure, books, books by the hundreds. But where are the people?

 

The lights suddenly go out, and a chill runs down Mark’s spine. Oh, hell. 

 

“Run!” Mark yells, turning lights on with his sonic screwdriver.

 

He can almost hear Chris starting to ask a stupid question but he must have swallowed the thought entirely when he sees Mark actually sprinting to the door. 

 

They run fast, faster but the lights they leave behind keep going out, one by one. There is a mahogany door at the end of the corridor that Mark knows better than to dodge. He points his screwdriver at the knob, whispering to it, “Come on, come on.” And the lights keep going off and this door won’t open, and come on, _come on_.

 

It is Chris who takes a couple of steps back and runs right into the door, forcing it open. They close the door behind them as soon they are in.

 

“What was that!” Chris pants, clutching his stomach.

 

Mark has every intention of answering. But first, he has to get Chris under the bright light coming from the dome in the middle of the room.

 

“Whatever you do, do not step out of the light,” Mark says, taking out his screwdriver. 

 

He picks up a few signals and curses under his breath because this is going to be a pain to get out of. Facing Chris, Mark opens his mouth. He is about to inform Chris of the danger when someone in a spacesuit bursts through another door.

 

Whoever it is takes off their helmet, revealing a Bambi-faced man with absurd hair and impossibly big brown eyes.

 

“You _asshole_ ,” Bambi says, striding toward Mark and punching him so hard Mark falls back and hits his head on the floor.

 

_**.01** _

 

The second time Mark sees Eduardo, his breath catches a little because he had almost forgotten about this. About Eduardo, the guy who punched him in the face. However, Mark’s brain is forced to snap into focus when Eduardo stares at him through the screen inside the TARDIS and dictates space coordinates.

 

Setting the TARDIS to appear exactly at those coordinates at the exact time is not difficult but Mark has to sort through the momentary confusion that is Eduardo’s face. 

 

“What’s he saying?” Chris asks while Mark remembers that Eduardo is a time-traveler, too.  

 

Mark shakes his head as if that will brush off his last memory of Eduardo. Looking back at the monitor, Mark realizes what Eduardo is going to do and types down every number Eduardo dictates. 

 

“Coordinates,” Dustin explains. “Who is he?”

 

“No one,” Mark answers before Chris can say anything stupid.

 

Out of the corner of his eye Mark can see Dustin raising his eyebrows at Chris, and Chris shaking his head. 

 

Within the five minutes it takes them to get to the designated coordinates, Dustin prods Mark with questions about Eduardo. 

 

“Just because you met Chris first doesn’t mean you have a right to deny me all the dirty deets!” Dustin exclaims at one point.

 

Thankfully, the TARDIS indicates Mark that they have arrived before he has to dignify that with a reply. Ignoring Dustin, Mark walks to the door, opening it.

 

Eduardo comes flying in a rush with such force that, when he lands on Mark, they both fall back, Mark hitting himself on the head.

 

“Ow,” Mark complains before the fact that there is a very real Eduardo on top of him kicks in.

 

“Well, hello to you, too, Doctor,” Eduardo says, smiling down at Mark like their faces aren’t inches away from each other. 

 

“Um…”

 

“You guys need a moment? A couple of condoms, perhaps?” Dustin suggests.

 

Chris dutifully smacks him over the head.

 

Eduardo chuckles before pulling himself off Mark, closing the door. He helps Mark up, brushing invisible dust off Mark’s shoulders.

 

“Thanks for that one,” Eduardo says, crossing the room to say hello to Chris and Dustin. “And you two haven’t changed one bit.”

 

“I’m sorry, do I know you?” Dustin asks.

 

“We haven’t met yet? Have I met any of you?” Eduardo asks back, turning around to stare at Mark.

 

“The Doctor and I know you,” Chris supplies when Mark can’t answer.

 

“I see.” Eduardo takes out his leather-bound journal. “Where are we? Have we done the mirrors yet?” Chris and Mark shake their heads. “The banshies? No? Jesus, I’m really early. Well, thanks, anyway.”

 

“You’re really early,” Dustin parrots in confusion.

 

Mark waves his hand without making any comment. He is already back to deciding whereto next.

 

“He’s a time-traveler,” Chris explains with a sigh.

 

“The Doctor and I,” Eduardo elaborates, bumping Mark’s shoulder like that is even a normal thing to do. “Have met on several occasions.”

 

“But we never seem to meet in the right order,” Mark says, without looking up.

 

“Time-travelers,” Dustin repeats.

 

Then Mark looks up. “What did I just save you from?”

 

Eduardo shrugs. “I had a thing they wanted. And I could’ve done so myself except I do need you for the next thing.”

 

“The next thing?”

 

“What do you know about the Weeping Angels?”

 

\--

 

‘ _What do you know about the Weeping Angels?’_ turns into a marathon of running inside a cave with a Dustin who is temporarily blind due to unforeseen circumstances, a Chris who won’t shut up for two seconds about Dustin’s blindness and an Eduardo who is trying very hard to get Mark to focus. Which Mark would do except the noise of people freaking out around him is a bit jarring and distracting.

 

“Don’t blink, don’t stare at them in the eye,” Mark orders over and over again as they make their way through the cave and into a forest.

 

“If I die here —” Dustin starts.

 

Chris and Eduardo reply at the same time, “You’re not going to die.”

 

Mark rolls his eyes and continues.

 

In the end, they manage to escape the Weeping Angels through a combination of intellect — on Mark’s part — and sheer luck. And maybe Eduardo helps when he finds the control room and teleports them out of the forest and onto another ship. However, it is Mark who ultimately gets them all back into the TARDIS, safe and sound.

 

“So, that was interesting,” Eduardo says when they are back in the TARDIS.

 

“I nearly died,” Dustin complains, rubbing his eyes as he adjusts to the light. “And you call that _interesting_!”

 

“The Doctor would’ve never let you die,” Eduardo replies, winking at Mark.

 

“Where to, now?” Chris asks.

 

“Eduardo?” Mark asks.

 

“Oh, right. I, uh, give me a second,” he answers, moving to the controls on the TARDIS.

 

“What are you doing? No, don’t do that! What the hell?” Mark protests as Eduardo presses buttons and enters numbers. “You can’t fly my TARDIS!”

 

“Oh, Doctor, I can do a lot of things,” Eduardo replies without sparing a glance for Mark.

 

Chris and Dustin snicker behind Mark’s back. The situation is unacceptable. And annoying. 

 

“You don’t know what you’re doing, so stop teleporting us to our deaths,” Mark says, glaring at Eduardo.

 

“There! All done.” 

 

“All done what?”

 

“The TARDIS knows where you’re dropping me off.”

 

Mark narrows his eyes at Eduardo, “Why can you fly her?”

 

Eduardo gives Mark a blinding smile. “Spoilers.”

 

Mark rolls his eyes as the TARDIS lands smoothly wherever Eduardo needed to be. 

 

“This has been lovely, guys. Pleasure as always,” he says, heading for the door.

 

The conversation is not over in Mark’s mind. 

 

“You can’t just say ‘spoilers’ to everything!” Mark calls back but Eduardo already has a foot out the door.

 

Following Eduardo outside, Mark prepares himself to have an argument about limits and people who are not allowed to touch his TARDIS. Eduardo, however, has other plans. He pins Mark to the door, stepping very, very close, disregarding Mark’s personal space altogether and ignoring the multitude of people staring at them in the city where they have just landed. 

 

“We agreed,” Eduardo says.

 

“I don’t remember,” Mark counters.

 

Mark would come up with reasonable arguments. He could tell Eduardo, for example, that he has been with the TARDIS for almost a thousand years, and Eduardo cannot possibly compete with that. Or that the TARDIS is very tricky and you don’t want to be dropped off in an inconvenient place.

 

But Eduardo is breathing absurdly close to Mark and his hands are moving to Mark’s waist. Then Eduardo is staring at Mark’s eyes and Mark’s lips. And he smiles, Eduardo _smiles_ , licking his lips. It is all very absurd. Because then, then Eduardo tilts Mark’s chin and presses their lips together. He deepens the kiss a little but breaks apart a couple of seconds after. 

 

“But I do remember and future you would be very angry if I told you,” Eduardo explains.

 

Huffing, Mark mutters under his breath, “Because you kissing me is not a spoiler.”

 

But Eduardo is still invading Mark’s personal space, so of course he hears Mark. Eduardo’s face does this thing where there are crinkles around his eyes from how hard he is grinning. For a moment, Mark worries Eduardo is going to bend over and start laughing at him. To his credit, Eduardo bites his own knuckles to keep himself from giggling but now he looks even more like a lunatic as he smiles around his own fist. 

 

“I just couldn’t help myself,” Eduardo says after a moment. Then, realizing he probably shouldn’t have said that, Eduardo closes his eyes and sighs. He stops grinning like a madman before saying, “See you next time, Doctor.”

 

With that, Eduardo disappears into the crowd. 

 

_**.00** _

 

By the time Mark wakes up, Chris is in deep conversation with Bambi’s evil twin.

 

“Who are you?” Mark demands, rubbing his cheek.

 

Eduardo groans from where he is showing some blueprints to Chris. “You have got to be kidding me.”

 

“Who are you and why did you punch me?”

 

“The Banshies?” Bambi’s evil twin asks. “Have we done that? Rome? No? Nothing?”

 

“What the hell.”

 

Evil Bambi’s jaw goes slack. “So you don’t know me at all. Never met me at all. Oh, fucking great.”

 

“Are you a crazy person?” Mark asks next because that seems like the only logical conclusion. 

 

“No. I am Eduardo Saverin, archeologist and time-traveler. And you are the Doctor.”

 

Mark narrows his eyes at Eduardo. “How do you know who I am?”

 

“We go way back, you and I. Trust me.”

 

“Why?”

 

“How about we get ourselves out of this place first and _then_ talk.”

 

“Sounds fine by me,” Chris interjects.

 

_**.02** _

 

They run into Eduardo a couple of times, once in Rome and once in New New York. It’s annoying, really, the way Eduardo won’t shut up about “spoilers”. He doesn’t quite kiss Mark again. What Eduardo does is he smiles brightly as he comes and goes with such ease, inserting himself seamlessly in between Chris and Dustin. He slots into Mark’s life, occupying a space by Mark’s right that Mark hadn’t realized was empty.

 

It’s annoying, that’s what it is. And unfair, the way Eduardo is always ten steps ahead. Mark knows he will eventually stumble upon an Eduardo that has no idea who Mark is. But after nearly one thousand years of life, Mark still hates the wait.

 

Then one day, it happens. 

 

Mark has been traveling with Chris and Dustin and they are in the middle of deciding where to go next when the TARDIS reroutes a distress phone call for Mark. 

 

“Well, I guess that’s decided, then,” Chris says while Dustin slumps beside him.

 

“This is not fair,” Dustin complains. “I really wanted to see those beaches.”

 

“You would have gotten skin cancer,” Chris chastises him. When Dustin opens his mouth to protest, he adds, “You would know that if you had bothered to read the whole planet description.”

 

It’s easy for Mark to tune them out as he redirects their course.

 

The TARDIS lands neatly for the first time since it last regenerated — and Mark is not counting that time with Eduardo, that was _luck_ — on the surface of a planet covered in blue fog. Technically, it is more turquoise than regular blue but when Mark pointed that out, Dustin asked “Are you sure you’re not, like, super gay?” and Chris rolled his eyes, saying, “Is that information really necessary or do you just like correcting people?”

 

So Mark shuts up and doesn’t mention the levels of oxygen in the atmosphere or the number of different life-forms inhabiting the place. Instead, he takes out his screwdriver, points it at the fog and lets it guide them to the people who called for him. 

 

After twenty-something minutes of walking amidst the fog and a very whiny Dustin, the three of them spot a bonfire not one mile away. 

 

To Mark’s surprise — or perhaps it isn’t really a surprise — Eduardo Saverin is hunched next to the fire, twirling a stick with a marshmallow above the fire. A freaking marshmallow.

 

“You called me here for s’mores?” Mark asks, arms crossed over his chest.

 

“Classic Wardo,” Dustin quips, moving past Mark and going for a marshmallow.

 

Dustin stops dead on his tracks when Eduardo pulls out a gun and points it at him.

 

“Who are you and why do you know my name?” Eduardo demands, shifting  his eyes between Dustin and Mark.

 

“Guys,” Chris starts.

 

But Mark stares at Eduardo pointing a gun at them. He stares some more before he breaks into a smirk. “ _Finally_.”

 

“Oh, god,” Chris mutters, a hand over his face.

 

“Who are you?” Eduardo repeats just as Dustin sits down and grabs a marshmallow.

 

“Dustin!” 

 

“What? It’s not like he’s going to shoot me.”

 

“Shut up! All of you. Now, explain. Who the fuck are you and why do you know my name?”

 

“Seems like I’ve caught up with you,” Mark says, still smirking. “I was getting tired of this ‘spoiler alert’ business. Now, if you stop pointing that gun at me, I’ll explain.” When Eduardo lowers his hand, Mark clears his throat. “Ahem. These are my companions, Dustin Moskovitz, who is currently stealing your food, and Chris Hughes, who is currently plotting ways to murder Dustin in his sleep. And I’m the Doctor.”

 

“The Doctor? The Doctor what? The Doctor who?”

 

Mark shrugs. “Nothing. Just, the Doctor. _The_ Doctor. And you are Eduardo Saverin, archeologist and time-traveller. And you have called for me.” 

 

Eduardo raises his eyebrows at him. 

 

Shaking his head, Eduardo replies, “I didn’t call for _the_ Doctor. I had no idea there was a Doctor.”

 

“Well, there is, and somehow you called.”

 

Eduardo looks between Mark and his marshmallows. “I’m making s’mores, I hardly think I need any help.”

 

“Well, something around here called for me.”

 

“Not me, Doctor.”

 

“And what exactly is it that you’re doing here?”

 

“I was commissioned to retrieve an old family heirloom.”

 

“On a different planet.”

 

“I didn’t say my client belonged to the family.”

 

Dustin snorts. “You’re _stealing_ a relique.”

 

“ _Retrieving_ a relique,” Eduardo corrects. “There’s a difference.”

 

“Sure there is,” Dustin says. “Man, have you changed. Will change?”

 

“Dustin, shut up.”

 

“I second that,” Chris quips.

 

“Hey!” Dustin says around a mouthful. 

 

Eduardo rolls his eyes. “If you don’t mind, I’m trying to work here.”

 

“But you called me!”

 

“I told you I—”

 

“You did!” Mark insists.

 

There is moment of pause where Eduardo looks like he might say something and then thinks better of it. In the end, Eduardo says, “Okay, I may have accidentally called you.”

 

Smirking, Mark replies, “‘Accidentally’.”

 

“An alarm went off as I was trying to —”

 

“Steal,” Mark interrupts.

 

“Retrieve the heirloom. There was a button that said ‘emergencies only’. I hit it and it stopped. But the heirloom disappeared.” 

 

“You hit a button without knowing what it would do?” 

 

“I was trying to buy time in case they had guards or something.”

 

“Fine, whatever. I’ll—”

 

Then, in a flash, Mark’s brain starts connecting dots and he can almost hear the cogs inside his head turning. Heirloom, fog, this planet. A stone. The royal court.

 

“Does he always do that?” Eduardo asks, interrupting Mark’s thoughts.

 

“Shut up, I’m trying to think.”

 

Someone laughs and Dustin answers, “Yes. Always.” Then adds, “But you seem to like it.”

 

“What kind of heirloom is it?” Mark demands. “Is it a stone? Deep blue, almost violet?”

 

“Yes, um, it’s attached to a ring?”

 

“A ring!” Mark repeats, smirking. Then he stares at the fire. “Put out that fire, someone is going to find us. You know, you’re a terrible thief, no camouflage tactics whatsoever.”

 

“I already told you, I’m not a thief.”

 

“You’re trying to take a royal seal with you, how is that not stealing?” Mark counters.

 

“Told you so,” Dustin says. 

 

“Well?” Mark asks expectantly, motioning at the fire. “Dustin, help me scan the area, we need to know what’s in this fog.”

 

Chris helps Eduardo put out the fire while Mark and Dustin set up a perimeter, scanning the fog. Mark’s screwdriver comes up with nothing but Dustin’s scan picks up a signal northeast from their location.

 

“Guys, we have company.”

 

As if on cue, a loud shriek vibrates through the air. The pitch is high and deafening to the point where they all have to cover their ears and shut their eyes in pain. But through it all, Mark hears the wings fluttering around them, thousands of them.

 

The noise lasts for less than five minutes yet it feels like an eternity passes before they can open their eyes again.

 

“Of all the things,” Mark starts, catching his breath. “You have to come and steal from banshies.”

 

“Retrieve, Doctor, retrieve,” Eduardo repeats. 

 

“Banshies?” Dustin parrots. “Like, mythical, crazy-fairytale-banshies?”

 

“Yes, banshies. Except they are obviously not as mythical as you think.”

 

“What the hell?”

 

“That ring you’re trying to _retrieve_? Is the last seal. It works almost like a TARDIS. You take that from them, and they’re trapped on this planet.” Mark stops, to look around and figure out an escape plan when it occurs to him. “You are not going to stop, are you?” Mark asks Eduardo.

 

This time, it is Eduardo who smirks. “I never fail.”

 

And for the first time since he has met Eduardo, Mark smiles, genuinely smiles at him. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

 

Dustin and Chris groan.

 

“We’re going after banshies,” Chris grumbles. “We are insane.”

 

Eduardo gets them into the castle, Dustin and Mark turn off all alarms and Chris makes sure none of their heads gets chopped off as they work the system. It takes Mark five seconds to figure out how to shut off the alarms long enough to buy them time. Dustin manages to get into the system and find blueprints. 

 

And from there it is all Eduardo. He finds where the ring has been moved to — a good guess, if you ask Mark — and figures out how to take it from its cage while giving them enough time before the herd of banshies shows up and they have to run for their lives.

 

Mark has never seen banshies this angry. Not that he can blame them. 

 

They make it to the TARDIS just in time to hear a couple of crazed, angry blue fairies crashing against the door. They are panting, bent over and braced on the rails of the TARDIS, catching their breaths.

 

“Are we thieves now?” Dustin asks, breaking the silence.

 

Chris smiles at him, while Mark smirks and Eduardo looks torn between rolling his eyes and laughing.

 

In the end, all four of them break out into hysterical guffaws like a bunch of drunken people. Mark’s stomach hurts so much, he thinks for a moment he will be sick but then Eduardo places a hand on his shoulders.

 

He is still breathless, still smiling. “It was a pleasure, Doctor,” Eduardo says, extending his hand to Mark. 

 

Mark takes Eduardo’s hand and that’s when he sees it. There’s a tattoo on the inside of Eduardo’s wrist. For the most part, Eduardo’s sleeve covers it so Mark can’t be certain but he’s seen this mark before. Space Pirates.  

 

Mark frowns, and Eduardo must be quite sharp because he yanks his hand away from Mark’s grip. “Goodbye, Doctor,” Eduardo says curtly.

 

“Wait, what?” Mark asks because Eduardo has told no one where to go, yet he seems all but ready to leave the TARDIS.

 

Then Eduardo does this thing where he almost reads Mark’s mind and says, “Vortex manipulator.” He is pointing at the ring all four of them just stole before he disappears into thin air.

 

Mark fights the urge to roll his eyes at no one in particular. He has no idea when he’ll see Eduardo again and a perverse part of him wishes Eduardo would have just told Mark about their future. But then Mark thinks about what happened with the Banshies. Spoilers are too much trouble. 

 

And then Mark remembers Eduardo’s tattoo, wondering what Eduardo did to get it. But Mark could barely see it. For all he knows, Mark’s imagining the whole thing. Plus, Space Pirates are supposed to have died centuries ago and Eduardo himself doesn’t look more than twenty-five. 

 

Shaking his head, Mark takes out a small moleskin to start keeping notes on Eduardo. He begins to write, starting with the Banshies and working his way back. However, when Mark gets to their first meeting, he stops, almost involuntarily. His throat goes dry as he stares down at the pages.  

 

_**.00** _

 

“Why are you here?” Mark demands, glaring at Eduardo.

 

“The Library has been inactive for quite a while,” Eduard explains after a pause. “I was commissioned to retrieve software. So I came, figuring whatever had caused the disappearance of people a hundred years ago had already gone. But, according to Chris here, it hasn’t.”

 

“What happened one hundred years ago?”

 

“Four thousand and twenty-two people disappeared.” Then, staring at the shadows, Eduardo asks, “What is out there?”

 

“Every single life form is at one point or another afraid of the dark. They might not know it, but it’s a very rational fear,” Mark says. Then, turning to Chris, Mark asks, “Do you still have that sandwich?”

 

Nodding, Chris rummages through his backpack and tosses Mark half a sandwich. Mark throws the sandwich into the dark. There is a loud noise, like an animal ravaging his prey. 

 

The color drains from Chris’ face. “What the fuck was that?”

 

Mark shrugs. “Vashta Nerada. Or the shadows. They like to eat, and we are probably the first fresh piece of meat in, what was it again? _One hundred years_.”

 

“So, all those people, they were eaten?” Eduardo asks.

 

“No, I already told you. These things eat, they don’t make people disappear. They leave bones behind. Even someone like you would notice that.”

 

“Doctor,” Chris starts in a warning voice.

 

“People don’t just disappear,” Mark replies dryly.  

 

Eduardo nods. “We have to take out these things first, and then find out where the people disappeared to.” He is looking very blasé about the situation. “This is not my first rodeo with you, Doctor,” Eduardo says next, as though he is answering Mark’s unvoiced question. “If we are gonna to find those people, we’re going to need a lot of light.” 

 

Mark adds, “And access to the OS of the Library.”

 

Chris is in charge of searching the room for flashlights, candles, matches or anything that can keep the shadows away. Meanwhile, Eduardo and Mark spread out the blueprints of the Library on a table. Eduardo points them to the control room, where the central database is located. He hands Mark a piece of paper, saying, “This is all the information I have on the OS.”

 

Once they are ready, Eduardo repeats the plan. They will run outside and not look back. Mark and Eduardo will lead the way to the control room, where they will hopefully find some answers. 

 

Mark shoves his hands inside his pockets, watching Chris re-tying his shoes. Eduardo, on the other hand, is hunched over his bag. Mark’s curiosity gets the best of him as he goes to stand next to him.

 

“After all these years,” Eduardo says, holding up an old, blue moleskin. “I still carry it with me.” Mark frowns because Eduardo stares at him like this should mean something. The thing is, Mark only knows Eduardo as the man who just punched him for no good reason. “That’s right,” Eduardo continues with a sigh. “You don’t even know who I am.”

 

Eduardo’s shoulders slump. His face is somber, sadder than before, and Mark can’t help but wonder what is it about that journal that makes Eduardo so miserable.   

 

_**.03** _

 

He gets stuck with Chris and Dustin in the year 4003 in the Kirkland Laboratories. Someone calls for the Doctor, and Mark convinces himself that this is Eduardo calling. They haven’t run into him for a while and something about the message makes Mark think of Eduardo. Mark is so sure, so certain that he doesn’t rush off. By the time the TARDIS lands, it is already too late and the planet is about to go on complete lockdown. There is a chemical virus spreading like wildfire, and Mark can’t find who called him. 

 

He can’t find the source of the virus and everything around Mark starts spinning with questions.

 

As the three of them run through lab reports and try to figure out what went so horribly wrong, Mark comes to the slow realization that most people on this planet are going to die. Sooner or later, anyone infected will succumb and that makes his throat thick. 

 

Chris has already stopped looking through the files, noticing Mark’s expression. But Dustin, he paces the lab frantically. 

 

“What can we do?” he asks, flipping page after page. 

 

Shaking his head, Mark feels a rush of anger hit him. He remembers, those first years after he started traveling. He remembers not caring about seeing people die. But death has this way of slowly getting to you. Mark remembers the promises he made to never let innocents die. Stupid promises, but he was too young to understand. Today he knows that some things cannot be changed. But still. 

 

He contains himself enough not to break anything around him but Mark is seething and it shows. 

 

“We can only make death easier for those who are infected and make sure whoever hasn’t caught the virus remains isolated,” Mark says, feeling so incredibly defeated that every bone in him hurts.

 

“Doctor, you can’t mean…” Chris trails off. 

 

“I won’t ask you to stay,” Mark explains. 

 

Chris nods reluctantly, because he wishes they could do more. But Dustin, Dustin is almost enough to make Mark go out in the open and get himself infected. Mark would do that, if it helped. Mark would split his veins and feed them his blood. But it won’t help, and Dustin’s insistence, his relentless questions and useless suggestions, they feel as though someone is drilling a hole through Mark’s skull.

 

“Dustin, shut up!” Mark snaps, at last. “Just. Shut up.”

 

Something about Mark’s face must give him away because Dustin takes one look at him and closes his mouth for good.  

 

They identify those who haven’t been infected and isolate them within the main labs. The little food the planet has is distributed within the families. They tell the people to make it last. No one knows how long this is going to take. This is the easy part. The fear in their eyes does not even begin to compare with the heartbreak of families separating when someone is told they are infected. 

 

They know they are going to die. 

 

There isn’t enough morphine for the entire population. Some people will die painfully and nothing can be done about that. They distribute the morphine shots the same way they distributed food, evenly and between families. Mark tries to be gentle as he tells them, when the time comes, they will have to choose who gets the shot. Some of them don’t understand. But the ones who do, well, they almost flat out refuse to take the morphine, unable to decide for themselves who gets to die peacefully and painlessly. 

 

Mark knows this isn’t fair. He knows this is not an option. He knows but it still makes him so irrationally angry because no one should have to make a choice like this. No one. 

 

This weighs him down. The misery, the pain, the frustration, everything weighs Mark down. He has to stop, for a few hours, to regain his breath and regroup. He knows he is doing no one a favor by being angry. Mark knows, and yet —

 

They remain there a week and it is quite possibly one of the worst weeks in Mark’s entire life. He knows better than to ask how Chris and Dustin are doing. They stay a little longer while Mark upgrades the Laboratories’ code to prevent further accidents. 

 

The vision comes to Mark after long hours of being deeply immersed in code. He thinks about how this could have been prevented, how if Mark had known sooner or if anyone had come sooner, that maybe no one would have had to die. That’s when an idea starts forming in his head. 

 

Mark waits to be back in the TARDIS to explain it to Dustin first because, if this is going to happen, a lot of coding will have to be written from scratch. 

 

“So, what you’re saying is we’ll be creating the first network that will connect all species everywhere?” Dustin asks after he takes a minute to process Mark’s ramblings.

 

“Yes, that’s exactly it.”

 

“But why?”

 

“Don’t be stupid. I’ve traveled long and far enough to know how many problems stem from poor communication.”

 

“Really, _you_? Mr. I Don’t Speak Unless I’m Forced To.”

 

“That’s different. I’m talking about species helping each other. Civilizations working together. Of course, we’d have to launch a beta test with a few to start out, but you get the idea, yes?”

 

“Yeah, I get the _idea_.”

 

Mark ignores the skepticism in Dustin’s voice. Instead, he starts planning where to set up, the first lines of code, the sort of features it should include. Eventually, Dustin starts nodding along, interjecting here and there to make Mark’s plans more efficient. 

 

By the time they tell Chris, Dustin and Mark have already gone through a rough draft of what the network will look like.

 

“So, what’s this thing going to be called?” Chris asks.

 

“Facebook,” Mark answers, like he has never been more certain of anything in his entire life. 

 

And this is how, a month after Mark disclosed his secret project to Chris and Dustin, they find themselves in the TARDIS again.

 

They have been traveling a lot more than usual, mostly because Mark is choosing their locations very carefully so they don’t end up accidentally involved in something. After all, Mark needs to keep the language platform updated and he can’t get distracted. They travel through time and space for two weeks, steadily collecting language icons and symbols here and there. It is by far the longest part of creating Facebook. 

 

There are many different species in the universe whose language the TARDIS can’t process on its own. There are those classified as a high priority because the species are still alive and those that Mark has reluctantly set apart to be collected later on. Nevertheless, these are all the sets of symbols and representations they need to gather before they can head to New Palo Alto on planet New Earth, where they have decided to set up. 

 

“This is our last stop,” Mark informs them at last.

 

“Where are we going?” Dustin asks brightly.

 

“The Delirium Archive.”

 

\--

 

The three of them have been fairly good at keeping this project underground. Mark says it has to be this way because if the wrong people find out about it, Facebook will die before it even begins. 

 

So when Eduardo randomly shows up in the TARDIS, just after they get the last set of icons from the Delirium Archive, Mark has a lot of trouble trying not to curse the universe.

 

“So, who are we saving today?” Eduardo asks happily.

 

Mark answers with a glare. As Dustin starts to babble about Facebook, he cuts in with a sharp, “Dustin!”

 

“He could help,” Dustin points out.

 

“I could?” Eduardo asks, his whole face lighting up. 

 

“We need to read these,” Chris says, gesturing at the collection of symbols. “And figure out the algorithm that would correlate them.”

 

“I can do it,” Mark snaps. “And what part of secret did you two not understand?”

 

“But we know Eduardo!” Dustin protests. “Plus he knows a future you or whatever.”

 

“So he says,” Mark mutters under his breath as he glances at Eduardo’s wrist.

 

He immediately regrets it as he looks up from where the TARDIS is translating the symbols. Eduardo’s usual cheerful face has turned somewhat somber. 

 

“I know you don’t trust me, Doctor,” he says in a flat tone.

 

Mark keeps waiting for Eduardo to add a cheeky ‘ _but you will_ ’. However, Eduardo simply sits down, staring at him. 

 

Looking down, Mark goes back to watching translations on the monitor. Eventually, he feels the need to say, “I suppose you wouldn’t tell anyone about this.”

 

Dustin fist-bumps the air. “Yes!”

 

And Eduardo smiles a little lopsided, and okay, this is going to be fine. 

 

“What do you need?” Eduardo asks, bringing his chair closer to Mark’s.

 

“The TARDIS is translating all the languages so we can incorporate the last planets to Facebook. What I need is the algorithm that will correlate the translations to the symbols and apply them to the main user interface.”

 

“I’m sorry, integrate this to the what?”

 

“Oh, right. So, Facebook. It’s like this massive communications system for the whole universe.”

 

“Wow.”

 

Mark smirks. “I know.”

 

“Will it work?”

 

“Of course it will.”

 

“And you need the translations because…”

 

“Well, what’s the point of Facebook if some civilizations are being left out?”

 

“They are dead.”

 

“Doesn’t matter, everything has to go on Facebook. And I need those algorithms.”

 

And Eduardo is, much to Chris’ and Dustin’s delight and Mark’s endless internal conflict of wanting to hate him but not really seeing how, a very illustrated individual. He nods along as Mark explains the details of what the algorithm should do and draws up a draft for it in the first two hours of work. Mark personally thinks it is very unfair because people who irritate him this much should not be allowed to be this smart. People who irritate Mark should also not be this useful and _nice_.

 

It just isn’t fair.

 

“Doctor, what do you think?” Eduardo asks, holding up a scrap of paper.

 

Mark takes the paper from Eduardo’s hand. He knows he’s been staring at Eduardo’s writs for a little too long when the paper is shaken in front of his eyes. Written on it is what looks like the final draft of the correlation. 

 

“Is that,” Mark starts, taking the paper from Eduardo’s hands to examine it closely.

 

And it is.

 

It is the perfect algorithm that they have been working on for days. 

 

And Mark is. Well, he is impressed, okay? Very impressed. And maybe a little jealous. But mostly impressed.

 

“Your look of absolute glee is making me think we need to get out and celebrate. I’m buying,” Eduardo says, taking his coat.

 

\--

 

By the time they make it back, all four of them have drunk enough to feel inebriated. Chris and Dustin are the first to go back inside the TARDIS. Mark himself is about to walk in when Eduardo holds him back. 

 

He yanks Mark by the arm, a little too strong. 

 

“You’ve been staring at my wrist, Doctor,” Eduardo says. It takes Mark by surprise because he doesn’t sound like he’s been drinking at all.

 

Mark shrugs. “Pirates have been dead for centuries.”

 

“Then I must be centuries old.” When Mark doesn’t say a thing, Eduardo goes on, “I wasn’t born with an immortal body. My crew… They died and I didn’t.” 

 

Eduardo hasn’t said much, and Mark isn’t sure what’s appropriate. He gets the gist of it. A crew of bandits trying to steal the secret of immortality. Eduardo should have died with them. Instead, here he is.

 

There’s a beat before Eduardo, staring at the floor like he can’t meet Mark’s eyes, whispers, “You think I’m a monster.”

 

“I don’t care,” Mark replies.

 

“Doctor I just—”

 

“It doesn’t matter to me,” Mark says because it doesn’t.

 

Hearing Eduardo say this, it doesn’t make a difference. It doesn’t make Eduardo any different. Mark looks at him, looks at this Eduardo in front of him and he is just… Wardo. 

 

“Doctor,” Eduardo says. He smiles, tentatively at first but when Mark returns the gesture, Eduardo explodes into this brilliant grin that outshines the universe. 

 

This time, Eduardo doesn’t wait, doesn’t stare at Mark or lick his lips. He leans in, smashing his lips against Mark’s. They kiss with their mouths open, wet and sloppy. 

 

Mark has never particularly enjoyed kissing. It’s too messy. But something about Eduardo makes Mark want it. He makes Mark give in and yield to the touch of his hands. They kiss and Mark, he has never wanted to stop time this much. Just stop and forget everything else. But Eduardo breaks them apart. He presses his forehead to Mark’s, breathes the same air as Mark, like they are both suspended, frozen in this second.

 

Like this, Mark feels like he doesn’t want to let Eduardo go. He wants Eduardo to stay, wants to ask him to stay.

 

Instead, Mark asks, “When will I see you again?”

 

Kissing him again, Eduardo replies, “Spoilers, Doctor.”

 

Eduardo steps back, turns around and starts walking away. Mark feels something rising in his throat. He wants to push it down and focus on something else. Anything.

 

He ends up calling Eduardo back, “Will I see you again?” 

 

Whirling around, Eduardo grins at him. “I wouldn’t leave you if I didn’t know you will.”

 

Nodding, Mark takes this answer and goes back to Chris and Dustin.

 

\--

 

With Eduardo gone, Mark lets himself get lost in his code. He hasn’t had a coding marathon in forever and now he has a decent excuse to stop sleeping. Mark makes Dustin work hard but never as hard as he does and in two months they have a proper layout. There is only one thing missing.

 

Mark has been going over this for a while. He is perfectly aware of his enemies and the extent to which the Alliance hates him and is willing to crush everything he creates. It is not like Mark can simply forget the numerous times the Alliance plotted to kill him so they could succeed in their plans for world domination. Which is why Mark has come to accept that he needs the Alliance’s database to protect Facebook from hack-attacks. Mark also accepts that he cannot steal from the Alliance if he wants to keep living. 

 

That all this eventually leads Mark to conclude he needs Eduardo’s help is just a happy coincidence. Really.

 

“Eduardo, I need you,” Mark says to Eduardo’s face on the monitor.

 

“I’m here for you.”

 

“No, I mean, I need you to, um, retrieve something for me?”

 

Eduardo’s eyebrows shoot up into his hairline.

 

“Don’t judge.”

 

Snorting, Eduardo gestures at himself, saying, “Doctor, this is a judgement-free zone. What do you need?”

 

“It’s, uh, sensitive information. Could you come?”

 

Eduardo agrees without a question, teleporting inside the TARDIS within minutes. 

 

“That was fast,” Mark points out.

 

“I may or may not have been waiting,” Eduardo answers with ease.

 

Rolling his eyes, Mark leads Eduardo to where he has laid out a picture.

 

“This,” Mark says, pointing at the picture of the box containing the Alliance’s database. “Is what I need.”

 

“I can’t steal that!” Eduardo replies, scandalized for the first time since Mark has met him.

 

“Retrieve?” Mark offers, smirking when Eduardo rolls his eyes at him.

 

“Whatever. That… is not possible.”

 

“Please, they are… not volunteering any information.”

 

“So, you want me to steal it?”

 

“They don’t know you. I go anywhere near that and I might as well be dead.”

 

Eduardo sighs, shaking his head. “The things I do for you, Doctor. You better start trusting me after this one.”

 

Mark almost confesses to already trusting him but then thinks better of it and figures Eduardo could use the incentive.

 

“Anything else you want me to retrieve? The original Daleks’ design? The cure for all diseases?”

 

“Only if you have time.”

 

“Asshole,” Eduardo says, but he still leans down and kisses Mark before he leaves.

 

\--

 

In the months Eduardo is gone, Mark manages to fully develop the language platform of Facebook’s code. It takes longer than expected because Mark still has to travel in search for all the characters the TARDIS can’t translate. However, he decides to travel on his own this time, leaving Facebook in the care of Dustin, and Dustin in the care of Chris.

 

Mark is not exactly all too excited to leave everything behind, and for the first time he thinks he is beginning to understand humanity’s need for permanence. It’s not all bad, though. 

 

Mark runs into Eduardo a couple of times, in Rome, again, and on the planet of mirrors and mirages. Eduardo manages to still be a cheeky bastard and say, “Spoilers, _querido_ ”, which is an addition that takes Mark aback.

 

Shrugging, Eduardo tells Mark his mom was Brazilian and taught him Portuguese and how to samba. “I’ll teach you, someday,” Eduardo promises. And Mark takes that promise as what it truly is: “yes, you will see me again”. 

 

Little by little, Mark develops a neat language platform that will allow users from everywhere, who speak any number of languages, to interact with each other. 

 

When Mark comes back, he still has to pull all-nighters with Dustin to fix the rest of the code. Chris starts force-feeding them after he realizes the coding marathons are not going to stop. Dustin is as hopeless as Mark is when it comes to promoting Facebook, which is why they leave publicity to Chris. And it has to be said, Chris is ridiculously competent. He finds them Sean Parker, who in turn finds them Peter Thiel and the angel investment Mark needs to hire programmers that can keep Facebook’s servers working. Thiel gets them set up in an office, where soon enough they are up and running. 

 

Sometimes, Mark leans back on his chair and stares at everyone else in the offices. The monitors are all on and Mark has already triple-checked everything so he knows he can take the break. Mark breathes in the smell of new technology mixed with coffee. And for the first time since he started time-traveling, Mark feels like he can stay put. 

 

At least for a little while. 

 

_**.00** _

 

As soon as they open the door, darkness starts engulfing them. They sprint forward, always forward and almost blindly, without stopping. Right until they find themselves in front of some sort of crossroad. 

 

Mark says right but Eduardo says left. They glare at each other for a minute while Chris sets up a perimeter of light around them.

 

“I’ve studied these blueprints for longer, Doctor,” Eduardo points out.

 

“It’s to the right,” Mark insists, stubbornly.

 

As the shadows start weaving their way through their perimeter, Eduardo steps into Mark’s personal space.

 

“I know we promised each other no spoilers but I need you to trust me,” Eduardo says. “I’m sorry.”

 

“You need me to trust you? Listen, I have no idea who you are or what you—”

 

“I need you to trust me, Mark,” Eduardo whispers in his ear and Mark’s blood runs cold.

 

“You know my name,” is the only thing Mark can muster.

 

His head spins with a million possibilities and combinations to answer one simple question: _why_. But Mark knows. He already knows, without calculating or plotting, he knows. 

 

“I’m sorry,” Eduardo repeats. “But I need you to trust me.”

 

Mark nods numbly. “So, left?” he asks.

 

_**.04** _

 

For some reason, Mark figures Eduardo will show up for Christmas or New Year’s Eve.

 

Eduardo comes back in the spring, knocking on Mark’s door.

 

Mark has at least twenty things he wants to say to Eduardo but he ends up blurting out, “You’re late.”

 

Eduardo’s smile is lopsided and tired. “Sorry.”

 

“How did you know where I live?” Mark asks next.

 

Eduardo exhales, and for a moment Mark thinks he is going to say ‘ _spoilers_ ’. Instead, Eduardo replies, “I called Chris.”

 

At this Mark crosses his arms over his chest, keeping Eduardo outside.

 

“Can I come in?” Eduardo asks when Mark just stands there.

 

“Fine.”

 

He leads Eduardo into the living room, where Eduardo drops his duffel bag.

 

“I have a guest room,” Mark offers, because Eduardo looks like he has been through hell and back.

 

“Thanks, that’d be great.” Pause. “I brought you a present,” Eduardo says next as he flops down on the couch. Opening his bag, Eduardo takes out a box wrapped in cloth that shines green through the material. “I even figured out how to open it.”

 

Mark gapes at Eduardo, then at the box and back at Eduardo again. Taking the box from Eduardo, Mark sets it on the floor so it is out of the way when he kisses Eduardo with everything he has. Kissing Eduardo is an impulse that comes out of nowhere, one that Mark delivers with a force he didn’t even know he had. Moving around, Mark manages to sit on Eduardo’s lap and kiss him deeper, properly.

 

“Hey,” Eduardo says in between kisses, combing his fingers through Mark’s hair. “I’ve missed you, too.”

 

“I never said—”

 

“Shut up.”

 

Nodding, Mark complies and lets Eduardo turn them around so that Mark is lying on his back as they make out like teenagers. 

 

\--

 

Eduardo falls in place with Facebook with so much ease that it makes Mark almost wonder how they made it so far without him. As it turns out, the Alliance’s database is not as complex as Mark had feared and, with Eduardo’s help, Mark writes a Facebook update that incorporates the Alliance’s data. He only adds it to the code, though, because Mark is not about to show off stolen data. 

 

Eduardo helps him run numbers and test user interfaces while Dustin works on every update Mark puts out and Chris designs a plan for the launching of Facebook. Dustin starts to keep more regular hours, if only because Chris is now on top of him pretty much all the time. It would make Mark laugh, really. Except that this is only happening because Eduardo is keeping count of the hours _Mark_ puts in and the hours in which he actually sleeps. 

 

The thing is, Eduardo is sneaky enough to make Mark double take himself and wonder if he is imagining his drawers filling up with non-perishables.

 

However, it’s the fruit that gives Eduardo away. It’s the apples that appear only after Eduardo comes back, and the kiwis that mysteriously keep showing up on Mark’s desk. Because Eduardo is the only one out of the four of them who has a preference for kiwis. 

 

“You know,” Mark says into the intercom one day after he sneaks a hand into his drawer, fishing for a pen and instead grabbing an apple. “I’d figured with you forcing me to have breakfast and dinner, it wouldn’t be necessary to stock my office with food.” 

 

Eduardo sniggers on the other end of the line. “The kiwis are a personal favorite but that’s just me.”

 

“I- You’re invading my drawers with fruit.”

 

“And the sky is blue. Well, at least on this planet.”

 

“What?”

 

“I thought we were stating the obvious.”

 

Rolling his eyes, Mark makes a noise that is a poor attempt at exasperation. “I gotta get back to work,” he says, hanging up.

 

He wants to hate Eduardo for this. For trying to control his life because Mark is a Time Lord and he doesn’t need a mother. But then Eduardo will shove some risotto in his mouth as Mark is mid-rant and it will be stupidly good. It’ll be the most delicious thing Mark has ever tasted and all his poorly collected determination to hate Eduardo will evaporate.

 

“Are you making me eat just to shut me up?” Mark asks after swallowing.

 

“If that were the case, I can think of a couple things that are far more entertaining for me,” Eduardo replies, wriggling his eyebrows. 

 

It makes Mark blush a deep shade of red and blink a couple of times before Eduardo sets down his spoon and kisses him, making Mark forget why he’d been blushing in the first place. 

 

\--

 

In the middle of the summer, Facebook is ready.

 

They launch it with a party that some of Mark’s oldest friends attend. It’s loud and crowded, with dim colored lights that keep flashing in their faces. By the end of it, Mark has drunk so much that he actually lets Eduardo lead him to the dance floor.

 

“What are you doing?” Mark asks, dragging his vowels. 

 

“I promised I’d teach you,” Eduardo answers.

 

“ _Wardo_ ,” Mark whines in his drunken state.

 

Shaking his head, he protests all the way as Eduardo places a hand around Mark’s hip and takes Mark’s hand with his other. Then they’re swaying in the dim lights. A purple flash colors Eduardo’s face. There is something in the way he grins at Mark that tugs at Mark’s hearts. The room sort of blurs in a drunken haze, and Mark can feel his hearts beating faster and faster. He has never wanted anything this much. 

 

And maybe this is a mistake. But how could anything with Eduardo be a mistake? Eduardo, who smiles openly at Mark. Eduardo, who keeps his promises and _always_ comes back. Mark takes in a deep breath and, as he holds it, he decides.   

 

Disentangling himself as the song reaches its end, Mark says, “Let’s go home.”

 

Grabbing Eduardo’s hand, Mark leads them outside to fetch a taxi. He keeps fidgeting all the way to the house and even drops a couple of banknotes as he is about to pay the driver. Eduardo sniggers at him, saying Mark is too drunk to coordinate. Which isn’t a lie. He _is_ very drunk. 

 

But he is also sort of nervous. 

 

“Hey,” Eduardo says after Mark drags him inside in a rush. He is grabbing Mark’s hands to stop him, forcing Mark to look at him. “What’s wrong?”

 

“Nothing.”

 

Eduardo cocks his head, giving him a look that says ‘I’m not stupid’. 

 

“ _Doctor_.”

 

Shaking his head, Mark exhales. This is it. Standing on his tiptoes, Mark wraps his arms around Eduardo’s shoulders. 

 

“Mark,” Mark whispers into Eduardo’s ear. “My name is Mark.”

 

Eduardo takes a step back. His eyes are wide, making Mark worry about having said the wrong thing. Mark wouldn’t know, he has never told anyone his real name. It flusters him, so ducking his head, Mark stares pointedly at the floor. But Eduardo, he takes a step forward and tilts Mark’s chin up, and he is smiling so hard the corners of his mouth look like they are about to collide with his ears. 

 

“Nice to meet you, Mark,” Eduardo says, pinning Mark to their front door. With a hand behind Mark’s neck, Eduardo kisses him, sucking on Mark’s bottom lip. 

 

“Wardo,” Mark whispers into Eduardo’s mouth.

 

“Mark,” Eduardo says, one more time. Then, “I love you.”

 

Something in Mark’s chest breaks, spreading white-hot liquid in his veins. He pushes himself up to kiss Eduardo again. 

 

And again. 

 

And again.

 

_**.00** _

 

Once they finally reach the control room, they start flicking lights and opening curtains. They lock the door and take as many precautions as they can before sitting on the floor to catch their breaths.

 

While they are at it, Mark catches Eduardo staring at him, like he is trying to find something that is not there. A version of himself that Mark does not know. Upon noticing Mark staring back, Eduardo shakes his head and half-smiles at him. 

 

Eduardo pretends nothing is going on but Mark can see the way his shoulder’s slouch before he has to square them back. When Mark stares back, he sees Eduardo’s pale face before Eduardo rubs his eyes, looking drained. He sees the flat line of Eduardo’s lips before the fake smile comes along and it’s back to pretending.

 

It’s unsettling because Mark knows he doesn’t have the full picture. Eduardo is the only person in the universe who knows Mark’s name and that is not an accident.

 

After a moment, Mark walks over to where the central database is. It takes him longer to understand the OS and longer still to start decrypting the code. It’s a fucking mess through and through. The kind of mess an OS only gets into when it operates by itself for far too long without even updating the code on its own. 

 

When Eduardo comes to stand next to Mark, he points a couple of things Mark has been missing. Mark is honestly too tired to give a fuck about who is right and who is wrong.

 

Then, out of the blue, Mark sees it. Everything suddenly makes sense in his head and it is brilliant, this OS is magnificent. 

 

“What’s the plan?” Eduardo asks.

 

“The people, they’re still in the Library,” Mark says. “The database ‘saved’ them. They didn’t disappear. They were ‘saved’.”

 

“I don’t get it,” Chris says from the floor.

 

“It ‘saved’ the people from the Vashta Nerada. But because it couldn’t teleport them outside, they remained in the system. They are all ‘saved’ in the database.”

 

“And how do we get them out?”

 

Smirking, Mark starts tapping on the keyboard. He reconfigures the script first, hacks the database and finds, like a light at the end of a tunnel, the ‘open’ function.

 

“Easy,” Mark answers as the floor starts shaking under them.

 

One by one, the four thousand and twenty-two people who had disappeared start showing up around the control room. And for a few seconds everything is perfect, great, amazing.

 

And then it all goes to shit as the ground shakes harder and harder.

 

“The OS, it’s too old, it can’t sustain all this movement at once,” Eduardo yells over the noise of things breaking as they topple over.

 

Mark groans, because of course, of course this would happen. He walks over to a staircase that leads downstairs where the energy source must be. Swallowing, Mark goes down, taking two stairs at a time, hoping this is not as bad as it looks. 

 

But when Mark gets there and takes one look at the generator fueling the whole planet, Mark thinks this is much, much worse than it looks. He turns around to go back up, only to find himself face to face with Eduardo. 

 

“Listen, you need to go back up there and tell them they have to jump,” Mark starts saying, rushing out his words as he turns on his heels to go to the generator.

 

“Jump? Jump where?”

 

“A crack is going to open,” Mark says, as he faces away from Eduardo to look for a way to buy them more time. “It’s going to teleport everyone out of here, but they have to jump in it. There’s not enough time, you have to make sure they understand that.”

 

“What about you?”

 

“I’ll be fine.”

 

There is a long silence. Mark has the distinct feeling Eduardo has not left when he whirls around to yell at him because _there is not enough time_. However, as soon as Mark turns, something hits his head and everything goes black. 

 

_**.05** _

 

Mark has never liked the word ‘domesticity’ and ‘home’ has always been his TARDIS. Mark supposes he stopped trying after his entire race died. Although the truth is, he only gave up on having a home after he outlived his first companion.

 

But Eduardo being here, brushing his fingers through Mark’s hair, it strikes Mark as domestic. And home. He doesn’t know if this place, this condo in New Palo Alto is home but Eduardo is here. Eduardo comes here and says, “I’m home.” And Mark smiles, despite himself, because he has never been a home to anyone. Until now.

 

They are in bed together, Mark with his head on Eduardo’s lap and Eduardo stroking Mark’s hair. 

 

“So, we’ve done the flying fish, and the crazy spiders, right?” Eduardo asks, and Mark nods sleepily. “You know, I think we’ve finally caught up.” Mark nods again, drifting off to the sound of Eduardo flipping the pages of his journal. “Unless there’s something else on your end,” Eduardo continues.

 

Mark turns his face so he can look at Eduardo properly. “There’s nothing else on my—” Staring at Eduardo’s eyes, Mark has a vision, a memory, rather, of Eduardo. Mark swallows hard. No, no, no.  

 

Eduardo smirks down at him. “Spoilers, I know,” he says.

 

And Mark, he can only remember and, no, no, no. Mark pushes himself up, kissing Eduardo hard. He sucks in a breath and kisses harder and harder still. Eduardo kisses back, pushes Mark forward. They fall back onto the bed, and Mark kisses Eduardo, and Eduardo kisses back, and he can almost forget it. 

 

But a voice in Mark’s head keeps playing and replaying like a broken record. ‘ _You asshole’_ , it says. 

 

The following morning, Mark convinces Eduardo he has to start traveling again. Eduardo looks at him funny, like he is about to ask what this is about. But in the end, Eduardo says, “I trust you” and packs a bag.

 

So Eduardo goes and Mark stays. They speak, through Facebook, through their phones that work through galaxies and time. Eduardo tells Mark what he sees, the things he is being asked to do by the people who used to know him way back. And Mark listens, nodding and sighing every time he hears Eduardo’s voice.

 

But he knows he is running out of time. That he has been running away from this, postponing and stretching the hours and minutes.

 

Mark knows.

 

Time always catches up with you.

 

\--

 

Days turn into weeks and weeks into months. Mark feels Eduardo’s absence deep in his bones. He feels a certain ache and emptiness that he carries around like a ghost. And still, when Eduardo suggests coming home, Mark says, “No, no you should see what’s out there. Trust me.”

 

“But I miss you,” Eduardo says one day, after it’s been more than a couple of months.

 

He looks tired, even through the screen Mark can tell he hasn’t been sleeping all that well. Not that Mark can speak much for himself. 

 

Yet, despite the dark circles under Eduardo’s eyes and Mark’s need to tell him “come home”, Mark asks Eduardo to trust him, just a little longer.

 

And when Eduardo lets out a sigh and agrees, Mark breathes out.

 

He feels the ache in his bones again and tries to push it away, again. And Mark has no idea what he is doing except for buying time until he comes up with something. For days, Mark can only think about Eduardo and the Library and, oh _god, Wardo_. He walks around the office like a zombie. Until the day Facebook’s servers crash because there is a bug in Mark’s code that is not a simple case of hacking. 

 

Snapping out of it, Mark tells Dustin to track the bug and puts every programmer on damage control. Finally, Mark calls Chris into his office, who arrives with Dustin.

 

“Tracked it!” Dustin exclaims, looking smug.

 

And to be fair, it was very fast.

 

“I think I’m insulted by your lack of faith in my superior abilities,” Dustin says when Mark stares at him.

 

Rolling his eyes, Mark replies, “And?”

 

“Well,” Dustin starts, less excited. “The bad news is it led to the Alliance.”

 

Chris and Mark exchange looks.

 

The Alliance, who has never liked Mark. In fact, the Alliance hates Mark viciously. And Mark understands, after all, he has ruined most of their evil plans for domination. But at this point, Mark figured they could all work together, if only for higher levels of communication.

 

“And the good news?” Chris prompts.

 

“Who said there was any?”

 

Mark considers his options but he already knows he needs information to do damage control. Mark needs help and he knows of only one organization that can have this sort of intel on the Alliance. Mark just hopes they won’t ask for too much in exchange for this information. 

 

“Get the Justice Department for me,” Mark says to Chris. 

 

Raising an eyebrow, Chris folds his arms over his chest, his skepticism showing through. “Doctor, are you sure this is a good idea?”

 

“No, but they are the only agency with data on criminals and…” Mark stops talking when Chris gives him a look. “More than half of my servers crashed this morning,” Mark explains. “It’s gonna happen again unless I know what’s infiltrating my system.”

 

“Fine.” Turning on his heels, Chris walks away but stops at the door. “Do you want me to call Eduardo?”

 

“No.”

 

So, of course Chris whirls back around to face Mark. He is frowning and about to say something. “I’ll get them for you,” Chris says instead of pressing the matter.

 

Mark watches him go before asking Dustin, “So, what is the good news?”

 

“It’s not exactly good news. It’s more like a, ‘this could be much, much worse’ type of situation.”

 

“ _How_?”

 

“Well, the damage they did is nowhere near as much as it could’ve been. They have infiltrated the entire code, Doctor. It’s like a freaking disease, not just a bug.”

 

“Oh, great.”

 

“Yeah. I mean, they have settings and code and symbols, _symbols_ , my system is trying to decipher but, truth is, they are presenting a pretty strong front. All allied up against Facebook.”  

 

“Thanks, Dustin. I feel much better now,” Mark growls.

 

“Doctor, you know this is—”

 

“Because they haven’t agreed to the terms, I know.”

 

“They could bring us down.”

 

Mark nods, rubbing his temples. Mark has always known the Alliance to be a potential threat. He asked Eduardo to pick up the database but Mark should have known better. He should’ve known not everything would be in there. Mark should have forced the Alliance to sign the terms. He should have forced them into cooperating, dammit. 

 

Mark tries not to freak out but Facebook is falling apart and slipping through his fingers.

 

The door opens again and Chris pops his head inside. “I have the Department on Channel three.”

 

The three of them sit at Mark’s desk to take the call.

 

The Head of Department greets Mark with a curt “Doctor,” before he cuts right to the chase, “We have enough information to help you with your problem.”

 

Mark raises an eyebrow. “And?”

 

“Our systems have more than sufficient data to provide you with counter measures that could take you years to figure out, Doctor. You may be the last of the Time Lords but even you can’t work through the code of the hundreds of people allied against you.”

 

“Hundreds?” Chris interrupts.

 

“I’ve pissed off a lot of people,” Mark replies, shrugging.

 

“But we need something in exchange.”

 

“My soul?” 

 

“No, Doctor. We need information, much like you.”

 

“On what?”

 

“Perhaps this is best discussed in private?”

 

Mark turns to Chris and Dustin. They stay in their seats but Mark orders them to leave.

 

“Seriously?” Chris asks. 

 

“Yes.”

 

“Doctor—”

 

“I know what I’m doing.”

 

“Okay,” Chris says, dragging a reluctant Dustin with him.

 

Turning back to the monitor, Mark asks, “On whom?”

 

“Space Pirate Eduardo Saverin.”

 

Mark swallows. This is why he had wavered when contacting the Department. Of course they would want Eduardo to account for his crimes.

 

“You want a petty thief?” Mark asks, in a very meager attempt to tone down Eduardo’s crimes. 

 

“An intergalactic thief who has stolen from and probably murdered many species, Doctor.”

 

“Don’t you have any bigger fish?”

 

“We want this particular fish.”

 

“I’ve heard he’s been inactive for quite a while.”

 

“Inactive does not mean dead.”

 

“Are you going to kill him?”

 

“No, he is going to serve time for his crimes.”

 

“Where?”

 

“Does it matter?”

 

Glaring at the screen, Mark snarls, “If I’m going to rat someone out, I’d like to know what’s gonna happen to him.”

 

“Justice.”

 

At this, Mark rolls his eyes. “I’ll get back to you,” he says before turning off the monitor.

 

\--

 

It’s wrong and fucked up and Mark wants to puke over it. There’s something pushing against his chest, making his ribs tight. Mark feels like giving up because being alive has taught him nothing, nothing at all if he can’t even solve a problem like this. 

 

It is wrong. It is so wrong but it is almost like killing two birds with one bullet. 

 

Mark runs his hands over his face. He wishes he could rewind so that he’d never have to meet Eduardo. He wishes Eduardo wouldn’t exist, wishes he wouldn’t mean this much because then it’d be easier. It’d be a matter of justice. 

 

It wouldn’t be this hard.  

 

\--

 

The loud crash of his monitor being smashed against the desk by Eduardo startles Mark into reality.

 

“How about now?” Eduardo demands. “You still wired in?”

 

Mark bites the inside of his cheeks, staring right into Eduardo’s eyes. 

 

“I’ve been summoned, _Doctor_.”

 

“It was the only way,” Mark lies. “You weren’t right for this and Facebook needs me.”

 

That is when it happens. When Eduardo breaks entirely. Mark wants to close his eyes, wants to forget, pretend this never happened. But a very real Eduardo is staring at Mark like the ground is disappearing beneath his feet. Mark’s throat goes dry. 

 

“You’re trading me!” Eduardo yells. His hands are on his temples and running through his hair, his eyes red and his mouth half opened. He runs his palms over his face and panting, out of breath, out of control. He gestures at Mark’s computer, at the virtual reality Mark has envisioned and created. Eduardo gestures at the work of Mark’s life and _screams_ , “For this! You’re trading me for _this_!”

 

“Wardo,” Mark starts like he wants to apologize, and he does, he wants to.

 

But he can’t because this is bigger than an apology and bigger than Eduardo hating him for the rest of eternity. 

 

“Don’t,” Eduardo says and laughs but it sounds more like a broken, choked noise that emerges from somewhere in between Eduardo’s lungs and his beating heart. 

 

Mark closes his eyes. It’s a second but when he opens them again, Eduardo is being escorted out by the intergalactic guardians of the Justice Department.  

 

_**.00** _

 

Mark comes to with a pounding headache. His first instinct is to rub the spot on his scalp but as he goes for it, he realizes his hands are cuffed to a pole. The next thing he notices is the blaring alarms going off from every corner, and all that fucking noise. 

 

Then Mark remembers the Library’s system, the Vashta Nerada, and really whoever cuffed him to this pole is a moron, honestly. Worst timing ever. 

 

“Fuck,” Mark mutters under his breath, and then, “Fucking fuck.”

 

Mark struggles with the handcuffs when Eduardo’s voice makes him raise his eyes from the pole. Mark gapes because of all the people Mark would have accused of being stupid, Eduardo never appeared on the list. 

 

“I was waiting for you. To say goodbye,” Eduardo says, and Mark catches onto what exactly is going on.

 

“No,” Mark barks. “You have no idea what you’re doing.” 

 

Eduardo opens his mouth but snaps it close. He frowns before whispering, “You knew.” He searches for an answer in Mark’s face but Mark’s only reply is silence. “You always knew that this is how it would end. That’s why you did it. You _knew_ ,” Eduardo repeats, his voice small. “That’s why…” Eduardo shakes his head and squeezes his eyes closed. When he opens them again, Eduardo’s eyes are watery, red around the edges. “You could never make me hate you,” he says like a confession as his voice breaks. “Never. And I should’ve seen it. I should’ve understood. But I didn’t. I’m sorry.”

 

“Eduardo, do not do this.” 

 

Eduardo can’t plug himself into that generator.

 

Eduardo can’t die.

 

Eduardo can’t leave Mark alone.

 

“If I don’t, then everything, everyone, will disappear,” Eduardo says. “Someone has to jump-start the system.”

 

“I can do it! Uncuff me, for fuck’s sake, don’t do anything stupid!” Mark yells over the alarms going off, yells over the red lights and all the fucking noise.

 

“You wouldn’t survive. You wouldn’t be able to regenerate, and you know it.” Mark opens his mouth to protest but Eduardo interrupts him. “And it’ll work if it swallows me. I’m a time-traveler, too,” Eduardo says. 

 

Mark pulls at his cuffs, tries to get them off but Eduardo is smart and his screwdriver is out of reach. “Don’t do it,” Mark asks, again.

 

Eduardo’s eyes soften, he takes a deep breath and walks over to Mark. He stares at Mark’s eyes and then his lips before placing both hands on Mark’s cheeks. Eduardo kisses him, deep and soft. 

 

Drawing back, Eduardo whispers against Mark’s lips, “You could never make me hate you, Mark.”

 

Mark’s breath catches in his throat as Eduardo kisses him on the forehead. Eduardo smiles a little, but it looks too tired and broken. 

 

“Don’t worry, you’ll see me again. Our story is just starting for you,” Eduardo promises before he walks to the door.

 

Mark pulls harder at his handcuffs. He can feel the metal digging into his wrists, cutting his skin and making him bleed.

 

Mark yells at the tops of his lungs as Eduardo sits down and fastens the straps around his body, effectively plugging himself into the generator. Mark’s throat is raw and his wrists are burning with the pain but none of it factors in as he screams for Eduardo with a force he did not know he had. Mark cries for him, yelling, “Don’t do it!” But Eduardo pushes down a button and light blinds Mark for a few seconds.

 

And there is darkness.

 

There is silence.

 

When Mark wakes up, Dustin is hovering over him.

 

**_.epilogue_ **

 

Mark rewinds, unwinds, twists, connects and unravels every thread of time he can find. He travels worlds and relives history over and over, searching, always searching for Eduardo. He writes it all down until Mark has journals, hundreds of books narrating their story.

 

He tries to correct his wrongs first but realizes the cracks would swallow the universe again. So Mark leaves them alone. He lets both of them hurt and live it again, over and over. Mark travels through the maze of time, meets a hundred different Eduardos who are all the same but infinitely different.  

 

Mark relives, relearns their history, knowing that one day, he will find it. He will find a way to unwrite that one moment in space and time. Mark knows one day he will find the perfect tipping point.

 

After all, he is the goddamn Doctor.  
 


End file.
